Sermon manuscript:
Today I’d like to follow the progression of Jesus’s thought
when he says to those Jews who believed in him, “If you remain in my word,
then you really are my disciples. You will also know the truth, and the truth
will set you free.”
Let’s begin by talking about remaining in Jesus’s Word. It
is not uncommon for people to pledge allegiance to Jesus. Lots of people are
willing to be identified as Christians or see themselves as Christians. Their
reasons for seeing themselves as Christians are many and varied. Perhaps they were
baptized. Perhaps they were raised going to church. There are some who go to
church all the time, so of course they have to be Christians, don’t they? And
there are those who have just made that choice for themselves. They choose to
be Christians. Who are you, then, to say that they are not?
Jesus himself, however, identifies the reason why anyone may
identify himself or herself as a Christian:
“If you remain in my word, then you really are my disciple.” The
opposite of that, then, must mean that someone is not his disciple. If you do
not remain in his Word, then you really aren’t his disciple.
This makes perfect sense if you think about it. Being a
disciple means being a follower. A good substitute for the word disciple, which
carries with it all kinds of baggage, is the more neutral word, “student.” If
you remain in Jesus’s Word, then you are his student. If you don’t remain in
his word, then, of course, you cannot be his student.
Anybody can say that they are a student of whatever they
might want. I can say that I’m a student of astro-physics. Although I can say
that, it doesn’t mean that I am. Someone could say to me, “But you don’t know
anything about astro-physics.” True. “You don’t read anything about astro-physics.”
That’s true too. “You don’t even think about astro-physics. It’s been days,
months, or years since you’ve given it any thought.” The assumption’s one
thing; reality’s another.
So also it is very silly for people to claim to be students
of Jesus when they never think of him, never pray to him, never hear what he
says, or if they do hear what he says, never act on what he says. I’m not the
church-attendance police. We live in a free country where everyone can listen
to and learn from whomever he or she wants, but I don’t see how people who
never hear, never pray, never worship, or never receive the sacraments of Jesus
can claim to be his followers or students. You know, though, that there are
many who claim just that, and they might be you or the people you know and
love.
We also should not think that mere attendance at the divine
service makes anyone a disciple of Jesus. Having Jesus’s words go in one ear
and out the other doesn’t help anyone. There are many people who attend church
week after week who hate some of the things that Jesus teaches. They think he
has terrible advice for how to live one’s life or how to be successful. The
only reason why they will tolerate hearing Jesus speak at all is because they
think it will give them salvation.
Thus there will be many surprises on Judgement Day. Many are
called; few are chosen. There will be some very angry people who will scream at
Jesus, “Didn’t we come week in and week out? Didn’t we sit there bored out of
our mind? Couldn’t we have been doing things that we liked?” But it will not be
difficult to prove how such people were not his disciples. Although they were
in the presence of God’s Word, they did not love it. Although they honored God
with their lips, their hearts were far from him. Let’s not kid ourselves. If
you don’t remain in Jesus’s Words, you aren’t his disciple. You don’t love the
truth. You aren’t free. You are still a slave of sin.
This is a good way to get at what we consider today with the
Lutheran Reformation. The Christian Church at the time of the Reformation said
a lot of stuff that people wanted to hear. In fact, the Roman Catholic Church
continues to say stuff that sounds pretty good if we all just get to make stuff
up for ourselves to believe.
They basically said, if you stick with them, with their
church organization, then you’ll be alright. Make sure you follow their rules.
Never disobey the pope, the church councils, the bishops or the pastors. Make
sure that you maintain your membership. Make sure you don’t get excommunicated.
Make sure you have a priest there for confession and last rights. If you
followed these rules (and really these rules aren’t too onerous), then you are pretty
much guaranteed that you’ll be fine. Eventually you’ll end up in heaven. Not a
bad deal.
This was handy in all kinds of ways. Ordinary Christians
didn’t have to follow Jesus’s commands. The monks and nuns could do that for
you. No need to worry too much about sins, because the church had a whole
medicine cabinet full of remedies, many of which have no biblical basis. Jesus
did not make any promises about bells, incense, candles, being shaved, pouches,
not eating meat, celibacy, indulgences, and a whole bunch of other things. And
yet these remedies were so old and they looked so pious, that everybody though
that they just had to do the trick. Plus, of course, the teachers and officials
swore up and down that these things worked. Holy Mother Church had said so.
They were so entangled in so many lies, so many good lies, and so many old
lies, that it took a tremendous amount of sorting out.
Something that is good to remember about Martin Luther and
the Reformation is that it was a process that went on for years. It wasn’t like
Martin Luther woke up one day and suddenly had it all figured out. What really
got the ball rolling for the reformation was his 95 theses or statements
against the Church’s sale of indulgences. He posted that on October 31, 1517.
That is why we observe the Reformation on that day. Luther was pretty sure that
there was something very wrong with just this one church practice. There was a
whole bunch of other stuff that wasn’t even on his radar yet. But what was of
utmost importance for his sorting out the truth from the lies was that he
differentiated between Jesus’s word and other words.
It is remaining in Jesus’s words that makes a person his
disciple. The Christian Church is not a building or a whole bunch of buildings.
It’s not a government. It’s not an organization with the pope at the head of
it. Jesus, in fact, doesn’t say one word about the so-called pope ever. There
isn’t even a single syllable about a Roman pontiff or being obedient to him.
The Christian Church is not even about me as a pastor, as though I’m someone
who bosses people around. The Christian Church consists of lambs who hear the
voice of the Good Shepherd. Jesus, the Good Shepherd, lays down his life for
the sheep. He knows them, and his sheep know his voice. His sheep hear his
voice and follow him.
It is the following of the voice or the words of Jesus that
makes anyone a Christian. If you remain in his words, you truly are his
disciple. If you do not remain in his words, then you are not his disciple no
matter how many ceremonies or robes or ancient decrees might seem to indicate
otherwise.
Luther and the other reformers distinguishing between
Jesus’s words, his apostles’ words, and everybody else’s words was what made
all the difference. To this day the Catholic Church claims that it can add to
God’s Word so long as it’s done with the proper pomp and circumstance. And
there are many others who do the same thing in their own way. The Pentecostals,
for example, think they can receive new revelations and tongues and miraculous
powers so long as it is done with the proper pomp and circumstance. Or the
ELCA, which believes that they can decide for themselves what is a sin and what
isn’t a sin, so long as it’s done with the proper pomp and circumstance.
The whole world, in fact, is filled to the brim and
overflowing with people who never stop telling you what to believe, how to act,
even all the way down to what you should eat and drink. They certainly can’t be
all telling you the truth because they contradict one another. How do we sort
out this cacophony of messages, all wanting to teach us?
It’s as simple as what Jesus says: “If you remain in my
words, you are truly my disciples. You will know the truth, and the truth will
set you free.” Jesus’s words are true.
I’d like to mention a very useful tool in this
regard—Luther’s Small Catechism. The Catechism isn’t the same thing as
Scripture, but, without a shadow of a doubt, what is in the Catechism is drawn
from the Scriptures. This tool is extremely useful in the midst of all the
different voices so that we can know what Scripture says about how we are to
act, in whom we are to believe, how we are to pray, and where we should turn
for grace, the forgiveness of sins.
Think of the tremendous truths that this little pamphlet:
The Ten Commandments teach us what is truly good, truly pleasing to God.
Everybody else’s ideas about what is good or life-promoting or life-giving are
just that—their own ideas. Everyone just does what is good in his or her own
eyes, but the Ten Commandments are God’s communication to us of his standards.
Anyone who takes seriously God’s standards for how we are
supposed to be will also learn how we are slaves to sin. Our desires are
contrary to God’s desires. Our desires say, “Do this!” and we can’t help but
say, “Yes, sir! On the double! On the double!” We are especially slaves to those
things that don’t look like sins—our own ambitions, our own honor, our own
pleasure. We lack what we should have. We do not want to love or sacrifice. We
do not love even though God is love. We do not sacrifice even though God showed
his love to us in the sacrifice of his own Son. How silly and shallow every
other standard for conduct is compared to the Ten Commandments as Jesus
explains them in his Sermon on the Mount!
But, as Jesus says in our reading, if you remain in his
Word, you are his disciple. You will know the truth, and the truth will set you
free. Then he goes on to say, “Amen, amen I tell you: Everyone who keeps on
committing sin is a slave to sin. The slave will not remain in the house
forever.” That is to say, heaven is not a place of evil and sin. The name
for a place like that is hell. So how do we slaves free ourselves? We can’t! A
slave’s a slave. If a slave were free it would no longer be a slave. But, as
Jesus says, “If the Son sets you free, you will really be free.”
We have been redeemed, that is, purchased and won, by the
holy precious blood and the innocent suffering and death of the Son of God, our
Lord Jesus Christ. We slaves of sin, slaves of the devil, have been set free,
not by God snapping his fingers, but the Son of God becoming sin for us,
suffering in our place, being punished in our place, and thereby bringing about
perfect atonement.
You remember this Bible verse, I’m sure: “God loved the
world in this way, that he sent his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in
him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into
the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.”
Jesus
said those words. You remember what Jesus said in our reading today: “If you
remain in my words, you are truly my disciples.” Those aren’t hard words to
be a student of.
Jesus is the teacher. Jesus is the Good Shepherd. Holy
Mother Church isn’t the Good Shepherd. Speaking in tongues isn’t the Good
Shepherd. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry who has their own thoughts about right and
wrong, life and death, and what we are doing here on this earth are not the
Good Shepherd. Jesus is the Good Shepherd who has laid down his life for the
sheep. He calls out with his voice, “Come unto me all you who are weak and
weary, and I will give you rest.” Jesus alone is the Savior. To him be all
glory, now and forever. Amen!
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